Deborah Klein Walker, EdD, is a behavioral sciences researcher with a focus on maternal and child health, public health leader, and advocate for public health and social justice,. She has more than 50 years of experience conducting research and evaluation in community settings, and developing and implementing programs. policies and system changes at the local and state levels, She was Vice President and Senior Fellow at Abt Associates for 13 years after spending 16 years at the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, where she was the Maternal and Child Health Title V Director, Acting Director for Substance Abuse Services, and Associate Commissioner for Programs and Prevention. Prior to state service, she was a faculty member for over a decade at the Harvard School of Public Health and Harvard Graduate School of Education. She currently is an Adjunct Professor at the Boston University School of Public Health and at Tufts University School of Medicine. She is a Board Member of Arbor Research Collaborative for Health; a member of the Advisory Board for New Hampshire Healthy Climate; Co-Chair of the Women, Children and Youth Working Group of the World Federation of Public Health Associations; and a member of the Editorial Board of the Maternal and Child Health Journal. She is a former president of the American Public Health Association, the Global Alliance for Behavioral Health and Social Justice (formerly, the American Orthopsychiatric Association), the Association of Maternal and Child Health Programs and Family Voices; a founder of New England SERVE and the Research Consortium on Children with Chronic Conditions; a former Board Member of the Institute for Community Health, Family Voices, Massachusetts Public Health Association and Healthy Mothers Healthy Babies; and a former Trustee of the Cambridge Health Alliance and chair of its Cambridge Health Department subcommittee. Dr. Walker is the author of over 100 peer reviewed articles, 3 books and numerous commentaries. She has been honored by organizations representing maternal and child health, disabilities and at-risk populations.